Late Night Conversations
by Clementine17
Summary: A simple conversation between a father and daughter. Future Fic.


"Sophie" he whispered into her room and he could almost see her name float through the darkness and softly settle onto her hair before it worked its way into her ear. She stirred a bit before turning over and squinting through the darkness. She saw the unmistakable outline of her father standing in her doorway, but the reason behind his presence remained hidden in the darkness along with the rest of the room.

"Dad, what are you doing?" she asked, her voice drizzled with exhaustion and jet lag. He always forgot that Washington was four hours ahead of Seattle.

"I didn't get to see you earlier," he replied shrugging. It was a lame excuse and they both knew it.

"It's two o'clock in the morning," she protested and as if to prove that it was in fact that early her head dropped back on the pillow, a clear sign that sleep was taking her over.

"Soph, Sophie," he said this time with much more power so she couldn't ignore him. Registering defeat, she finally sat up from the bed.

"What?"

"Come downstairs with me," he said and gestured towards the stairs. She looked as if she was about to say something, but rethought it and instead grabbed an old sweatshirt from the floor and obediently followed him. There was a time when she would arrive home at this hour after having snuck out to see Will and he would be waiting up for her, unless he had a surgery in which case it would be her mother. Still fogged by sleep, she had to reach her hand out to lightly skim the wall in order to give her feet some sort of directions. She had not been home in six months, but it suddenly felt like six years as she collapsed onto a kitchen chair to face her father.

The years had been good to Alex Karev and he had kept the good looks that had gotten him in so much trouble when he was younger. The only difference was that now his hair was grey and he had to wear glasses. At that moment he was focused on finding something in the refrigerator, while his daughter slowly fell back to sleep in the chair.

"Do you want chocolate milk?" he asked, reappearing with milk and chocolate syrup in hand. Sophie's head snapped up and she had to rub her neck in order to keep it from immediately becoming sore.

"Sure," she replied, attempting to hide the feelings of confusion swirling around her.

"I would offer you coffee, but you really shouldn't be having caffeine in your present condition."

"You can say pregnant, it's not exactly like you don't deal with this on a regular basis," she said with a slight smile. Alex suppressed a grin and continued to make chocolate milk. He handed her a full glass and went to sit across from her at the large table.

"Yeah, it's just in my mind you're still five and telling me that all boys have cooties."

"I'm pretty sure that after I told you that I added that Will was exempt from it."

"Yes, though you didn't use the word exempt."

"Still, you should have known," she said bringing the glass to her lips and gulping down half of it.

"That you would marry Miranda Bailey's son, believe me it was always my greatest fear."

"Yeah, well, sorry to make it come true," she replied with a smirk. It never ceased to amaze Alex how much of himself he saw in her. The smirk was one of the things that she could so perfectly reproduce that at times he wondered if she actually was his; that somehow his DNA had magically found its way into her genes. They were interrupted by the sounds of her mother coming downstairs. She stood in the doorway for a moment surveying the scene before her.

"Should I even ask?" she finally said walking over to stand by her husband. He took her hand in his and pulled her onto his lap.

"Dad wanted to make me some chocolate milk," Sophie said raising the almost empty glass to show her mother.

"Of course, the two am chocolate milk craving, should have known." 

"You're funny," Alex told her and then leaned in to give her a chaste kiss. Even after twenty-two years of marriage she still looked as beautiful to him as she had on their wedding day. Age had also been kind to Ava Karev and her face had come to suit her and her life.

"And with that I think I'm going to go back to sleep. I am in fact sleeping for two now and I want to look halfway decent when my husband arrives here tomorrow," Sophie said finishing her glass and getting up to put it in the sink.

"Good night sweetheart," Ava said, getting up and giving her daughter a hug, "I'm so happy you're home."

"Me too," Alex said as Sophie bent down to hug him also.

"Good night, try not to stay up so late," she said after they hugged, adopting the all too familiar fake parent tone she always used with him. When she was a child she would use it to tell him he needed to work less and spend more time with them.

"We'll try," he said and right before she went up the stairs called out "love you."

"Love you too, both of you," Sophie said turning around for a moment and then continuing back up to her room and bed.

"Two am chocolate milk meeting?" Ava asked Alex as soon as Sophie was out of range to hear them.

"Is it now a crime to want to spend time with my daughter?"

"Alex," she said. She had a way of saying his name that just made him melt. A tone that reminded him who he was speaking to, that he couldn't get anything past her. Slowly letting out a sight to buy himself some time he finally spoke again.

"She's pregnant Ava. She's pregnant and married and a television producer. For a moment I wanted her to just be our daughter. Is that so wrong?"

"No, it's not, but you have to acknowledge what she's done, what she's accomplished," she said moving closer to him.

"I know, she's incredible and talented. I just, I miss her so much."

"Me too," Ava replied and then pulled Alex up into a hug and repeated, "me too."

"We did well though. I mean how many parents can talk about the fact that their daughter created a hit television series?"

"Not that many," she said with a laugh.

"Let's go back to sleep, we can talk about Sophie's accomplishments in the morning," he said already leading her towards the staircase.

"Okay, I taped some of the episodes that you missed by the way. And I can give this much away, the gorgeous attending that the naïve and depressing intern is sleeping with has a major secret."

"Let me guess, he's married."

"It's not fair, you always know the plot twists that Soph puts into it."

"Yeah, wonder why that is," Alex asked and slipped into the bed next to his wife.

"Yeah, I wonder. Go to sleep you have to go to work tomorrow."

"See you in the morning," he said and then realized that she had already fallen back to sleep. Rolling over to look at the ceiling Alex couldn't help but smile and think that they really had done a good job with Sophie. He then shifted to look at his sleeping wife and his smile grew even wider. Life wasn't that bad, not that bad at all.


End file.
